The Kings tied a season high with two power-play goals and nine power-play attempts today

The Kings had a season high 42 shots

The Kings have beaten Colorado four straight times and are 7-0-1 in the last eight head-to-head overall

KINGS HEAD COACH TERRY MURRAY:

(Re game recap): “We made it interesting at the end just through getting too casual, a little careless with some plays at critical times at the game. You go into the third period with that kind of scenario you want to make sure you’re able to lock it down. Good teams do. You don’t get reckless or careless and start taking some penalties, especially the high sticking penalties…We have to clean that part of it up right away.”

(Re Sturm): “I found out at about 9:15 this morning…I had been thinking about it [not starting Sturm] through yesterday, watching Colorado play the last couple games with their line up, I certainly had Westgarth on notice…The player that was going to be out would have been Sturm.”

(Re Trade Deadline): “There have been zero conversations with Dean and I about any player that’s out there…I like our team. I like the way it is right now, we’ve got a great chemistry, and that’s so important, to have that chemistry. You can put a lot of different people into the dressing room and if it doesn’t work, boy, you’re very frustrated as an organization…We’ve got a good group of guys that play hard for each other.”

KINGS DEFENSEMAN DREW DOUGHTY:(Re game recap): “Obviously pretty happy with the game we played today. We dominated pretty much the whole thing, but obviously not happy with our lapse at the end there; good teams shut things down, and we didn’t do that today but we can in the future.”

(Re Colorado’s late comeback): “We definitely can’t be taking penalties that late in the game, you see what happens, they almost caught up and took it to OT and that’s not something we want to be doing. We’ve got to learn from it, but [we’re] happy with the game.”

(Re his goal): “Everyone was down low, Kopi [Kopitar] made a great bank pass to me and from there I just had to take the one-timer and get it on net. It wasn’t a perfect shot or anything, but it squeaked through and went in.”

KINGS FORWARD ANZE KOPITAR:(Re game recap): “It’s tough… you try to put them on their heels as much as you can. They’re a speedy team. Sometimes it’s tough, but they were playing physical, we answered right back, so that was a good thing to see.”

(Re having goals in three straight games): “I’ve been cold for too long before, so it’s nice to get a couple goals here and hopefully I can continue producing like that.”

(Re Sturm getting picked up by Washington): “It’s tough. It’s one of those things where Marco [Sturm] wasn’t here for a long time, but he got along with everybody in such a short time so it’s tough to see him go. But, at the end of the day it’s a business and you’ve got to do what you’re told and he got picked up and there’s not a lot we can do about it.”COLORADO HEAD COACH JOE SACCO:(Re game recap): “Penalties didn’t help our cause. We’re taking penalties because we’re making some mental errors. We made it close and we hung around and stuck it out till the end but we need to be better than that. We have to start games better to put ourselves in a position so that we’re able to stay in the game for 60 minutes. Today we got behind and we started chasing the game after that.”

“The team that wakes up first and is ready to go first is going to give themselves the best chance to win. We just need to be better, there’s no question. We can’t start games like that, it’s tough to play catch-up in this league.”

“Anytime you have new players it takes a while to build chemistry but that’s not why we’re at where we’re at. These guys have been nice additions to our team and they’re only going to get better as we move along. I’m excited to have these two layers here and I think they’re going to make us a better team when it comes down to it.”

COLORADO GOALIE BRIAN ELLIOTT(Re game recap): “You never want to let in any goals obviously but we took a few too many penalties. You’ve just got to try to see as much as you can. We did a good job coming back, we got to focus on that and know that we can score and have confidence that we can do it. We need to be a unit of five out there and I think we’ll have success.”

“It’s a good group of guys, young guys, and I think it’s a good fit so far. We’re struggling right now and it’s tough to hang in there when we’re struggling but we just need to have a good attitude, come to the rink with a smile on our face and know that every day is a new day and know that we can do whatever we want with it.”

COLORADO DEFENSEMAN JOHN-MICHAEL LILES:(Re game recap): “We just didn’t play. Obviously they’re a talented team, a big team, and they took it to us in our end for quite a bit of time. It’s not so much about making plays but about getting it in, getting the forecheck and when you do that, when we have our legs going, that’s when were effective. We most definitely weren’t effective in the first two periods.”

“This time of year is always tough. When we’re in a rut like this I think that anything can happen and that’s the nature of this business. I’ve said that lots of times that it’s a performance driven business. When a team isn’t performing you search for answers and it’s the unfortunate part because you never want to see teammates go anywhere or friends go anywhere. What can I say? We’re not performing to where we need to be. That’s the bottom line.”